(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display apparatus and a lighting unit and, more particularly, to a liquid crystal display apparatus and a lighting unit, in which a plurality of substantially U-shaped cold cathode tubes to which electricity is supplied by an inverter substrate are held parallel relative to a reflector panel.
(2) Description of Related Art
An Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-324592, there has been proposed a structure in which terminals of cold cathode tubes are attached directly to a substrate by soldering. Such a structure allows electrical connection to the cold cathode tubes to be made without using connectors, wires or the like, thus making it possible to provide a lighting unit in which the number of parts thereof is reduced.
The above-mentioned lighting unit is of a type in which one of terminals of the straight cold cathode tube is connected to a small-sized common wiring substrate to which the terminal of the cold cathode tube is to be connected, and is not of a type in which the terminal of the cold cathode tube is connected directly to an inverter substrate. A wire for causing the inverter substrate to be connected to the common wiring substrate is required, so that there is a problem that a leakage current is produced in the wire. The common wiring substrate is satisfied by only providing a common wiring, so that the common wiring substrate may be made thinner. However, the inverter substrate is provided with an inverter circuit, so that the inverter substrate may not be made thinner. Therefore, it is necessary to contrive to stably hold the inverter substrate and contrive to prevent a thickness of the lighting unit from increasing. Moreover, in a case where the above-mentioned technology is applied to a U-shaped cold cathode tube, there is a problem that, when one of terminals provided at both ends of the U-shaped cold cathode tube is subjected to soldering, the other of the terminals rises up from the common wiring substrate and is hard to be subjected to the soldering.